This is another “rent-your-own” weekend, as the two new choices at the box office are almost equally horrid, as in very.

* “Edge of Darkness“: There is an e-mail going around the Jewish community, asking people to boycott this movie, as it stars open anti-Semite Mel Gibson (whose father is a Holocaust denier, and he probably is, too). I wholeheartedly agree with the message of the e-mail, but I was afraid I’d like this movie, and I’d have to tell readers it’s a good movie, yet not to see it. Well, my fear was immediately alleviated, within about 20 minutes of this piece of typical left-wing garbage for the gullible.

You know the drill: an evil American defense contractor (aren’t they all evil, in the Hollywood playbook?) mass-murders innocent left-wing activists and employees who are trying to expose the company’s evil activities. Oh, and did I mention that the defense contractor, “Northmoor” (probably supposed to be Northrop),” is in bed with an evil, effeminate Republican Massachusetts U.S. Senator, to whose campaign its CEO is a big contributor? Well, they made this movie before Scott Brown’s election, but ya never know. Things can always be quickly edited to fit Hollywood’s latest propaganda narrative.

But, wait, it gets worse. Then, there’s the “conspiracy”: the evil the company is trying to hide is that it manufactures dirty bombs and nuclear weapons for the Defense Department, which are designed to look like they were made in third party countries. The word “jihadist” is used in reference to that (“jihadist dirty bombs”), so apparently, sub rosa, evil America is framing or trying to frame the jihadists and “other countries” in terrorist attacks and poisoning left-wing activists with radiation. Nauseating enough for you?

Mel Gibson plays a Boston cop (with a transparently inaccurate Boston accent), whose daughter was an employee of the defense contractor. She was helping the left-wing activists and trying to expose the company’s evil, villainous activities. The activists died of radiation poisoning that the defense contractor visited upon them to kill them. And Gibson’s daughter is poisoned and shot. He investigates, preaches and moralizes, is in a lot of action scenes, and makes friends with a hitman. Then, everyone dies. Capitalism, defense contractors, and America’s weapons to defend itself and our national security–all of these are evil. The end.

Remind me again why so many mindless pseudo-conservatives (like Bill O’Reilly) idolize this cretin, Mel Gibson. When I was leaving the screening, I was in an elevator with two apparently working-class, middle-aged couples, one of them White, the other Black. They were talking about how “true to life” this movie is, and “it happens every day.” I asked them when a defense contractor has ever poisoned and mass-murdered its employees and made nukes and dirty bombs to help America frame jihadis. Of course, they couldn’t answer, because it’s simply never happened. But that didn’t stop them from sticking to their mind-numbing ideology and repeating their muttering about how “it happens every day,” and it’s so “true to life.” Yes, far too many Americans are stupid, and they can’t allow critical thinking and reason to get in the way of their cult-like consumption of Hollywood Marxist jingoism. If it’s on the screen, it’s “true to life.”

The only truism here is that, Mel Gibson’s Jew-hatred aside, there’s something in this movie for every flavor of America-hater and far-lefty. And that’s why it gets . . .

FOUR MARXES PLUS AN OBAMA AND A BIN LADEN

“When in Rome“: Damn it. Barack Obama says he’s closing Gitmo, and yet here’s the perfect 90 minutes of torture to get even the worst terrorist to talk. Absolutely horrid. So stupid, so silly, so, so, so . . . such a waste of time that, guys, if your girlfriend drags you to this celluloid pain, bring reading material and wait in the lobby. I’d rather kill myself than sit through this. Plus, a fat, aged Don Johnson gets a paycheck as the philandering father of the bride. Even more torture for the terrorists to watch.

Kristen Bell goes to Rome where her sister is marrying an Italian she just met on a plane. While there, Bell strikes up a romantic interest in Josh Duhamel, but sees him kiss another woman. Distraught, she takes off her shoes and enters the Fountain of Love, where she steals five coins of people who threw them in . All five just so happen to be men–incredible. When she gets back to New York all five–Will Arnett, Danny DeVito, Dex Shepard, Jon Heder, and Duhamel–pursue her mercilessly, as they are all under the spell of the coinholder.

This is supposed to be a romantic comedy, but it’s hardly romantic, and definitely NOT funny. I’m not sure which is worse, the stupid storyline, the cheesy, unfunny jokes, or that I wasted 1.5 hours of life I’ll never get back. Possibly the dumbest movie ever. And if not, it’s close enough. Skipworthy to the nth degree.

46 Responses

The e-mail was accurate. This is high quality Bin Laden cinema… which is just as well since Bin Laden has now embraced the Left’s cause du jour – climate change! Now there’s another good reason to be against liberalism even as it slimes and defames those who work hard every day to keep our country safe.

Jaden, Jews may be reflexively liberal and I hate their mindless stupidity and loathing of a country that has given them unprecedented freedom and security. Still, I don’t like the way you characterize Jews. Other people are liberal too and I don’t see you mention them at all in your post. You can disagree with how American Jews are harming their own best interests but just pinning a guilty by association label on Jews makes no sense whatever. The webmaster of this site is a Jew and happens to be conservative.

NF: Jaden–a conservative anti-Semite–had her comments deleted. Sadly, I seem to be getting a lot of these anti-Semitic comments and e-mails from the “right,” these days. DS

Jews have long been liberal because it soots their ethnic interest. look up Kevin MacDonald he is a professor who has done a lot of research into this. They used liberals to weaken the WASP power structure than when the left became less pro-Israel and the Soviets turned against Israel many Jewish liberals became Neocons like our friend DEbbiel. They still hold many leftist views such as being pro-immigration and calling their political opponents racist or anti-semites. There are some good Jews who are paleocons and libertarians such as Paul Gottfried and Peter Schiff but most Jews who call themselves conservatives are NEOCONS.I know this may get deleted but I want to get my point across. I am sick of those who say Jewish liberals are voting against their ethnic interest because its a lie.

Debbie, that’s true and thinking like that won’t persuade American Jews to see that conservatives are right about the danger this country faces. The late William F. Buckley tried to purge the conservative movement of such hateful thinking but as Jaden’s comments show, its a lot of work to hold the line on it. All the more, we should have zero tolerance for anti-Semitism, racism and bigotry in this country. I’m glad to see you had her comments deleted from your site.

Buckeley was no better than leftist Jews like Abe Foxman he bannished anyone who critiseized Israel or immigration as racist and paved the way for all these neocons to take over the conservative movement.

(Off topic here)…but speaking of Leftists…The other day at CNN that (expletive deleted) “news” (?), or tabloid boy, Sanchez started attacking “wall street bankers”, going on and on. Then, Susan Lisovicz went on air to defend investors on Wall Street (ie, she had to explain how capitalism works, and if banks fail, then so do the small time investors and that everyone can be hurt…Sanchez was raised in a Communist country, that’s Cuba, and apparently has yet to truly grasp that not all of Wall Street is composed of evil, “fat cat” bankers.) Anyway, upshot, today is Susan Lisovicz’s last day at CNN. Her contract wasn’t renewed. (Erica Hill and Heidi Collins are also gone, btw.) (Yeah, well I guess that’s the “new” CNN — keeping a Sanchez (even expanding his program by an extra hour — this ridiculous tabloid) while letting a seasoned, intelligent, level-headed, Lisovicz go…)

Thanks for saving me time and $$$. Was going to hit a matinee this afternoon but now can save that $9.50 (NYC prices even with a discount). Edge of Darkness sounds absolutely awful. Hope it loses a fortune. And what’s with these idiots you ran into on the elevator? The power of the big screen. Frightening. Resurrect Joseph McCarthy. As bad as this kind of movie is, it is amplified by its overseas viewing. Criminal. When the credits role it should read “Jihad Preductions Present a Bin Laden Movie….”

Edge of Darkness sounds like it has a very stale theme. Sludge like this has been produced for decades. The China Syndrome in 1979 and Silkwood in 1983 are earlier examples of the same genre. There are no ambiguities or shades of gray in such films, since they are agitprop posing as art.

Interesting that people thought of “Taken” after seeing the preview for Edge of Darkness. When I first saw the preview, my reaction was “I liked that movie when it was called ‘Mystic River’.” Looked exactly the same from the previews, even down to the Boston location and accents.

Just for that reason alone I knew I wasn’t going to see it (Cuz it looked like Mystic River, not cuz it was in Boston).

I’d rather watch Roman Polanski’s “Frantic” – made in the 80s, the quintessential search and rescue story. Its all action from opening to closing reel and its two very enjoyable hours of pure escapism in Paris, France. Stay away at all costs from “Edge.”

Hey CM (Curt Maynard). Do you know that Satan approves of your anti-Semitic website? Well, he does–and it is very appropriate. I, of course, find your website to be reprehensible. We Jews love the truth. In fact, truth is the Jewish way. If you want to know what the truth looks like concerning whatever topic is under discussion–whether it’s about Mel Gibson plus another movie here in this post, or on any other topic–take a look here at Debbie Schlussel’s website and that is what the truth looks like.

I saw Edge of Darkness this afternoon. Like some others who have commented I expected the movie would be like Taken (judging from the trailers) but instead it reminded me more of Chinatown or L.A. Confidential (except in this case taking place in Boston)–a regional crime-mystery-thriller showing layers of deceit and ulterior economic motives (with a strong liberal subtext–apparently de regueur for this subgenre). In Chinatown there are ruthless land developers; here we have the greedy defense contractors. In Chinatown the line “It’s Chinatown” becomes a motif; in this movie “Everything is illegal in Massachusetts” becomes the refrain. Lame.

Mel Gibson has been attempting for a while to ingratiate himself to those liberal critics suspicious of his supposedly conservative Christian fundamentalism. Perhaps this movie will do the trick and convince Hollywood and elites he really is one of them after all. Sad.

Deliberate and gratuitous swipes are taken in the movie against FOX news (specifically Roger Ailes, the “boss”–not so much the poor frantic Fox news reporter who it’s implied has to follow Ailes’ poor management) and REPUBLICAN senators who are pictured as speaking with a haughty mien and an aristocratic English accent. At the center of the mystery, as you point out, is a conniving plan by defense contractors, business interests, and Republicans to build a “dirty bomb” which the US can presumably set off amongst civilians so as to frame Middle Eastern terrorists? ?!?!?! And this is “true to life” and “happens every day” according to the people you met exiting the theater?

Another disappointment was the way that Republicans and private defense contractors are shown in the film to slip radioactive thorium into the food of anyone who gets in their way. I mean, there really IS a country that uses a$$a$$ination by radiation poisoning, and it’s not the US: it’s KGB-ruled Russia, under Putin, as in the cases of Litvinenko and Yushchenko.

I don’t get it…didn’t he have a hand in creating the movie “The Passion of Christ”?

How did he become this jew-hater all of a sudden?

B: He’s been a Jew-hater all his life. Perhaps you forgot how he told a Jewish police officer that the Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world, etc. Passion of the Christ shows the Jews responsible for killing Christ, which simply isn’t the case. He refused to disagree with his father’s statements that the Holocaust never happened and that it’s impossible for 6 million Jews to have been mass murdered in it. DS

Josh Duhamel was on a latetalk show tonight, claiming that “some critics” have declared his movie to be the funniest movie of…”
The Decade”! Debbie, from your review, I daresay it wouldn’t even be the funniest movie from 1870 to 1880.
I have no interest in Gibson-he was adequate in “Signs” but that’s about it. I recently watched “Bird On A Wire”, Gibson’s 1990 failure with Goldie Hawn, and it was just sad.

I’m sorry, but I don’t get at all why you believe that anyone who is antisemitic is a horrible person, while at the same time you frequently bash Muslims and clearly have a great hatred towards them. Isn’t that extremely hypocritical? Bashing one’s religion and then condemning anyone who bashes your own is extremely ignorant, immature and flat out wrong. Please respond to this, I really want to know how you think this is justifiable.

CH, there is nothing hard to understand about it. It is very logical:
A. All anti-semites are horrible persons. (True)
B. All Muslims are anti-semites and modern Nazis. (True)
C. Therefore, all Muslims are horrible persons. (True)

There is nothing wrong with hating a religion that worships as its chief “prophet” a pedophile, has no respect for human life, tries to conquer all civilizations, and is antithetical to American values. Do we really want these type of barbarians in our country?

1. Wow, there is easily just as many anti-semitic Christians there are anti-semitic Muslims in the world because both groups are minorities, you can’t pull the bullshit that all muslims are horrible, racist people. You are just as discriminatory as the anti-semites you condemn you fucking hypocrite.

Haven’t seen ‘Edge of Darkness, but I Have to comment on ‘Inglourious Basterds. This movie would have been great except for the horrible casting of Brad Pitt. He no more fit that role then Jay Leno playing Jack Bauer. This director was out to lunch. Pitt looked like a little kid trying to play a grownup. I can think of at least 4 actors who would have been credible in that role: Gene Hackman, Harrison Ford, Denzel Washington and Tom Hanks. Although it shouldn’t have, it ruined my whole take on this film.

Debbie, as you can see some others here, some of the ads for Edge of Darkness do seem to be trying to portray this as a type of Taken plot as Gibson says something in the trailer about getting revenge for his daughter. Reading your review it’s of course not even close.

Speaking of Taken, Luc Besson announced he’s completed the script for the sequel.

I hope you are reviewing Besson’s From Paris with Love. It looks like my type of movie with a bunch of guns and bombs that blow up real good!

According to the trailers, it appears they are taking on terrorists. Surprisingly, it seems Besson is a French guy, a French guy!, who with taken and maybe this one is willing to call a terrorist a terrorist. Not to mention he is one of the few people in the movie industry that has blaseted Roman Polanski.

JW: Seeing it early this week, review up Friday. Looking forward to it. I can’t wait! I like Besson–loved “The Professional” AND “Taken,” both by him. DS

“Edge of Darkness” is another American remake of a foreign production. In this case, a British mini-series from many moons ago. Maybe all you right-wingers should gather your shekels and make a right wing movie?

The best thing about “Taken” was that it showed Liam Neeson TORTURING people for a righteous cause! Those scenes telegraph unmistakably that TORTURE is ethical under certain circumstances — as, for example, when a charismatic actor is trying to find the scumbags who murdered his daughter. This can only have a good, subliminal effect on the PC-MC-numbed Westerners who watched that movie, who can’t be so retarded that they remain eternally incapable of putting two and two together.

As for Schlussel’s epithet “far Left” to describe Gibson — the epithet may well apply to the director, producer and writer of this movie, but not to Gibson. Gibson is an example of a (rare) right-winger in Hollywood, Catholic and conservative on many issues — but nevertheless so right wing, he veers off into antisemitism and conspiracy theories. Gibson’s right wing exemplifies how when you go too far right, you end up at the same extreme as the far Left: conspiracy theories about how the white West, with all its businessmen and politicians, is evil, and thrown into the mix are all the evil Jews who enable that evil West in some kind of cabal.

Either that, or Gibson’s a whore.

H: Actually, he’s not a conservative on much of anything and openly supports isolationism. As for his “conservative” social views, well, he just fathered a kid with someone not his wife. DS

Mel Gibson is also not a Catholic, either. He is in a weird fringe breakoff group that does not acknowledge the authority of the pope. To divorce a wife and leave eight children behind for a mistress is hardly Catholic behavior. Nevertheless, he wanted the Catholic Church to grant him an annulment, which it wouldn’t do, so his wacky father headed a staff in his fringe church that granted him an annulment. He thinks of himself as a god that can do anything he wants. He is a real nutcase.

Why does anyone waste time going to the movies, anyway? Just a bunch of leftist pap in varying degrees, from the blatant Oliver Stone/Michael Moore genre to the subtler “Avitar” garbage. And the latter was not so subtle, I heard. But I can get dragged to something Clint Eastwood does. Enjoyed Gran’ Torino and Flags of Our Fathers.

Make it clear: All Politicians, Lawyers, and Bankers are whores.
That applies to all media personnel as well. Just get over it.
Yes, Mel Gibson is a whore. And he is a whore I would pay for.
Maybe twice, if I got the money. Whores aren’t cheap you know.

Will skip all the others, agree on “The Professional”.
(Some whores are not worth the effort…..)

Oh, and after doing my military stint, I decided I am not racist, and I am not an anti-semite.

I hate all of you, equally. After all, I am an AMERICAN.
The rest is just garbage to separate the trash for recycling day.

I was dragged to this movie by my wife (suffering from cabin fever for the week inside with the kids on snow days).

Thanks to my evil right-wing indoctrination, I was able to recognize the leftist agenda in this movie. I was MAD! I was audibly talking so everyone around us could hear on the way out.

My first clue was when they were showing a newscast on the TV and it showed the name crawler below the Mass. senator — (R-MA). The next clue was when Gibson’s character was visiting the evil defense contractor to ask about his daughter, and they showed pictures of the evil defense contractor posing with — gasp — George W Bush! As Gibson’s character notes, “interesting group of friends…”

I’m beyond mad. I’ve decided these people will no longer get my money! I used to enjoy Gibson’s movies, but they have gone off the deep end too often.

It shouldn’t surprise me that “left wing” to Israel firsting Big government Neocons is a movie about how big government and corporations collude and conspire. Yes- how “left wing”. Could the phony fraud “right” in this country get any more idiotic or government loving?

Oh, that’s right. The only time “Big government” does anything wrong is when it gives pittances to black people.

The “right” in this country is a joke. It seems “conservatism” is little more than being a military worshipping moron whose politics haven’t progressed an iota since Vietnam.

This isn’t 1969. People who oppose US foreign policy are not hippie commies who want “Jihad” to take over the world (another moron belief of the fraud DC centric right wing).

Now- I really want to see this movie. If Neocon traitors hate it- it must be good.

Chris Dowd, you hit the nail on the head. Conservatives, (really the Neocons) of today are all government worshipping, military can do no wrong robots. All have one mind and cant think for themselves. In their worldview, corporations can never do any wrong, and the military is a flawless institution with no stains in its history. This isnt a left-wing movie at all. If you sheep paid attention, Emma’s boyfriend said that the left-wing group was not the best of the bunch either. They did bad things for their agenda also.

Conservatives stand for small government and fiscal responsibility. Guess what, ruling the world and being the world police was not one of the founding tenets of this country, which conservative drones now distort.